


Fading Memories Blending into Dull Tableaux

by cashewdani



Category: The Office (US)
Genre: Angst, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-06-24
Updated: 2007-06-24
Packaged: 2018-01-15 02:55:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1288564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cashewdani/pseuds/cashewdani
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sitting alone in her new apartment Pam can kind of remember why she always wanted Roy to take her out on Saturday nights.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fading Memories Blending into Dull Tableaux

TNT has been playing _Deep Impact_ all weekend and Pam’s already watched it once, even though Elijah Wood freaks her out. She has it on because it’s either this or an actual filmed surgery of someone getting her breasts done. Sitting alone in her new apartment Pam can kind of remember why she always wanted Roy to take her out on Saturday nights.

Poking at her half frozen, half overcooked _Lean Cuisine_ she misses her old microwave. She also misses the way the stairwells didn’t reek of cigarettes where she used to live and that the landlord wouldn’t just leave things on her doorstep.

Apparently what happened is the woman who had lived here before Pam was supposed to empty out her storage unit in the basement when she moved, but hadn’t bothered to do that. So on Tuesday Pam had become the proud owner of a large cardboard box that was ridiculously heavy and a child’s tricycle.

She was going to try to get a forwarding address from the post office for her generous benefactor, but then she’d had to stay late at work the past few nights, and the branch near her wasn’t open on weekends. 

With two glasses of wine in her and only a few bites of Lemon Chicken that stupid box is staring at her from where’s she’s been tripping over it all week. And she knows she said she wasn’t going to open it, even if she couldn’t get in touch with anyone, but she has to know what’s inside.

The cardboard has been rubbed smooth in the corners, and the tape holding the flaps closed is mostly for decoration. She’s able to peel it off easily, which is good because she has no idea which of her drawers have a scissor in their contents.

Inside there’s a slightly smaller box, and she feels almost like she’s opening up a nest of Russian dolls. This one has an address on it, and postal stamps saying _Undeliverable Mail_ and _Return to Sender_.

It does wind up having to be necessary to find the scissors (in the drawer to the left of the stove she makes a note) and pours herself another glass of wine at the end of the search. She sits cross-legged on the carpet and turns down the TV where Leo Beiderman is just finding out that he can have more sex than anyone in his class.

The entire box is filled with pictures. Cracking leather-bound albums and negatives and lots of what used to be white envelopes with dates scrawled on them.

She looks at the black and white images of presents under Christmas trees, women in bathing caps at the beach, little girls in coats with matching hats. Weddings and communions and an entire album of men in service uniforms mugging for the camera across the sea in Europe. She looks at pictures of a border collie with the various family members. One that has, “Our first car” scrawled on the bottom.

Most of them aren’t captioned, and some have become so yellowed and washed out that it’s impossible to make out what was being photographed. A whole collection have become stuck together and melded into stacks of celluloid.

She flicks through and watches children grow and sees their parents age and it’s making her chest hurt to look at them. It makes her think about when her grandmother would let her sit in her lap when she was a little girl, and explain who all the people were and how in some way, they were all a part of Pam.

She keeps going, through all the homemade birthday cakes and men in undershirts out at the country. Past the frilly Easter dresses and bouffant hairstyles and costume jewelry.

When she stops, she wonders who the box was intended for. Who these people are. If somewhere there’s a little girl who’s supposed to be sitting on her grandmother’s lap finding out that all of these people helped her to exist.

Looking at the clock she realizes it’s too late to call her mother, but she feels anxious and depressed and she doesn’t want to be alone right now.

She picks up her cell, and hits the number 5 to skip down in her address book. Passes by Jan’s office extension and selects Jim Cell, pressing the green button.

She’s bumped directly to voicemail, which she hadn’t expected before remembering he has a girlfriend and not everyone spends their Saturday nights getting nostalgic and maudlin about people they don’t even know.

She debates hanging up, but it takes her too long, and then there’s the beep she’s supposed to say something after. “Hi. I’m just having a weird night, and I know you’re probably out, or busy, which is great, but I thought I’d try you in case you weren’t. This is Pam by the way. I’ll see you Monday if you don’t get a chance to call.”

Hitting the little red circle on her phone she feels like an idiot and starts to clean up her living room. On the TV, Morgan Freeman is saying, “heroes die but they are remembered” and Pam can’t stop herself from crying.

She turns the screen off and puts all of the photographs away. The wine glass and her fork get rinsed in the sink, and the plastic tray gets thrown into the garbage. She washes the tear tracks off her face with the soap the girl at the makeup counter told her is supposed to be good for balancing her complexion. Whatever that means. She brushes her teeth and climbs into bed, listening to cars driving by the complex.

In the dark she wonders if she’s ever going to have pictures of her children growing up. What it would be like to wait to find out you’re going to be allowed to live due to a lottery. If Jim is ever going to be enough of a friend again that she’s not going to have to make excuses for him.

She thinks she tears up again before she goes to sleep, but she’s not really sure. The next morning there are no missed calls on her phone, but _Zoolander_ is thankfully on Comedy Central. She laughs along while Derek mispronounces eulogy and tries to put the voicemail out of her mind.

She makes oatmeal like her grandmother used to, with lots of cinnamon, and plans to spend next weekend with her parents because she can’t take this anymore.


End file.
